spadework
spa·de·work
noun
1.
dull or routine preliminary work preparing for an undertaking
Origin
From spade + work.
Related words
Broader terms
WordNet 2.1 (Princeton University). Wiktionary (CC BY-SA). CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. WordNet 2.1 Copyright Princeton University. All rights reserved. Wiktionary content is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike Licence.